Signs from Allah: History, Science and Faith in Islam
104. Sir Syed Ahmed Khan- Part 2
By Prof DrNazeer Ahmed
Concord, CA
In the dialectic between Europe and the Muslim world, Syed Ahmed Khan of India occupies a unique position. He was perhaps the first Muslim leader to contemplate the possibility of coexistence between the two global civilizations. Muslim reformers before him had either totally disregarded the European challenge (Shah Waliullah of Delhi, Shaykh Abdul Wahhab of Arabia and Shehu Dan Fuduye of Nigeria fall into this category) or were hostile to any accommodation with Europe. The initiatives taken by Sir Syed had far reaching consequences for the Muslims. He demonstrated the possibility of coexistence and cooperation between the European and Islamic civilizations, although in his own lifetime, with the British firmly entrenched in India, he could achieve no more than a supportive role for Indian Muslims.
Syed Ahmed Khan was born in 1817 near Delhi, into a distinguished family. He received his early education in the traditional disciplines of Qur’an and Hadith and was then exposed to an English education. When the Sepoy Uprising of 1857 broke out, he was employed with the Company as a civil servant in the “Northwestern Provinces”, as the area west of Oudh was then called. The carnage of the Uprising and the subsequent decimation of the Muslim intelligentsia left a major void in the Islamic community of northern India. The initial response of the community was to conserve and withdraw into its social cocoon. While the British viewed the Muslims with deep suspicion, the Muslims shunned the British as infidels and foreigners who had usurped what had been rightfully theirs. Hostility and resentment fed upon each other and it looked like the Muslims would miss the opportunity to be a part of the new order imposed by newcomers from the British Isles.
Given the educational, political and social backwardness of the Indian Muslim community, Sir Syed felt that its best option was to cooperate with the British. As long as mutual suspicion and hostility between the British and the Muslims of northern India persisted, the latter could not take advantage of any opportunities that a more cooperative environment might present. Accordingly, Sir Syed recommended to the Muslims that their interest, for the time being at any rate, lay in seeking a working relationship with the British. This position was at odds with that of the Hindu nationalists. Since the Hindus were far more advanced educationally and they were also the numerical majority, they could package the demands of their community in a “nationalist” terminology. For the Hindus there was co-linearity of a national and communal vision. This was not so for the Muslims. Except in the northwest and the northeast, they were a small minority in the great landmass of the subcontinent. The aftermath of the 1857-1858 uprising, the decimation of their leadership, their educational backwardness and their numerical inferiority ensured that they could not compete with the Hindus on equal terms.
The years following the Great Uprising saw the first stirrings of a nationalist movement in India. Most of the nationalists were English-speaking Hindus and Parsis. An English education gave the Hindus not only access to government jobs but enabled them to articulate their social and political aspirations. The Indian National Congress was formed in 1885 by an Englishman Allan Hume to encourage Indians to provide input and feedback to the government on how the administration of the Raj could be improved. In later years, the Congress grew to be the most powerful political organization in British India and political demands grew to give political representation to the Indians. Sir Syed was concerned that the Muslims would be submerged in a vastly Hindu India should political initiative pass on to the Hindus. He articulated the fears of the Muslim community in these words:
“India, a continent in itself, is inhabited by vast populations of different races and different creeds. The rigor of religious institutions has kept even neighbors apart. The system of caste is still dominant and powerful . . . In a country like India where caste distinctions still flourish, where there is no fusion of the various races, where religious distinctions are still violent, where education in its modern sense has not made an equal or proportionate progress among all the sections of the population, I am convinced that the introduction of the principle of election, pure and simple, for representation of various interests on the local boards and district councils would be attended with evils of greater significance than purely economic considerations . . . .The larger community would totally override the interests of the smaller community and the ignorant public would hold Government responsible for introducing measures which might make differences of race and creed more violent than ever.”
Sir Syed opposed the participation of Muslims in the Indian National Congress as he was concerned that representative government based on a one-man-one-vote concept would leave the Muslims at the mercy of the more numerous Hindus. His fears were reinforced by the movement in 1867 to replace Urdu, a language that had evolved through a Hindu-Muslim linguistic synthesis, with Sanskritized Hindi. Sir Syed saw that education, at least Western education, far from bringing the two great communities of the subcontinent closer together, was separating them further apart. As the movement to replace Urdu with Hindi gathered momentum, he wrote: “I am convinced that the two communities will not sincerely cooperate in any work. Opposition and hatred between them, which is felt so little today, will in the future be seen to increase on account of the so-called educated classes.”
Sir Syed’s opposition to Muslim participation in the Indian National Congress was based on his conviction that the Muslims of his day were not ready to compete with the other communities in education and politics. The destruction of the manufacturing base in Bengal and Uttar Pradesh had eliminated the artisans and merchants who had formed the economic backbone for the Moghul Empire. The moneylenders and the talukdars, most of whom were Hindu, now took their place. The differences between the two communities were exacerbated in the aftermath of the Sepoy Uprising of 1857-1858. The British had singled out Muslim leaders for punishment. In Delhi alone, over 27,000 Muslims were hanged, with many thousands more in Meerat, Lucknow and Allahabad. With the introduction of English as the medium of instruction, Muslims had fallen further behind. Meanwhile, the Hindus had taken advantage of the new opportunities, had acquired education and were able to fill any positions offered to the Indians. Sir Syed felt that the introduction of representative government at that stage in history would solidify the advantage of the Hindu community over the Muslims and would relegate the latter to a permanent handicap.
Sir Syed did not live to see the full impact of the reforms introduced by him. It was left to later generations to realize the benefits of his initiatives in education and politics. He passed away in 1898. Twenty-three years after his death, in 1921 Aligarh College blossomed into Aligarh Muslim University and became a magnet for Muslim intellectual activity in the subcontinent. The generations that came after him derived their inspiration from the legacy of Sir Syed and went on to carve out their own destiny. He stood tall among the reformers of the 19th century who gave a new lease and a new direction to Islamic civilization.
Some among the later generations would call him a revolutionary, some would label him an apologist, but there is no doubt that Sir Syed Ahmed Khan opened the door to communication between the Muslims and the Europeans. Until he came along, this door had been locked shut with a steel bar of mutual suspicion and hostility.
(The author is Director, World Organization for Resource Development and Education, Washington, DC; Director, American Institute of Islamic History and Culture, CA; Member, State Knowledge Commission, Bangalore; and Chairman, Delixus Group)
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